"Cutting Corners" alleges that the Bank's Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF) — which provides seed funding for REDD projects — has rushed its review process and is failing to follow its own rules set to protect indigenous people and forest communities. Such groups fear that without a proper framework, REDD could be used by governments and carbon traders to force forest people off their lands.

"In this flawed process forest communities have not been properly consulted. As a result, donors could be complicit in a new global drive reinforcing old top-down policies that will only lead to more forest destruction," said Saskia Ozinga, Coordinator of FERN. "We have seen from the EU's FLEGT process, which aims to control illegal logging, that a proper consultation process will take years, but trying to shortcut consultations will just lead to long-term failure."

"If measures to respect the rights of forest peoples are at the heart of efforts to combat deforestation, then forest and climate policies could do some good," added Tom Griffiths, Coordinator of the Forest Peoples Program's Responsible Finance Program. "It is alarming that the early government plans, approved by the World Bank, are simply business as usual. None of these REDD plans deal with the critical issues of governance, human rights, land tenure reforms and Free, Prior and Informed Consent.

"To attain sustainable forest and climate initiatives, forest peoples must be fully consulted about their design. International donors must also ensure that human rights and forest sector reforms are guaranteed before any international funding is released to developing countries for their national actions on forest and climate issues."

"Cutting Corners" comes shortly after Friends of the Earth International (FOE), an environmental activist group, announced its opposition to REDD via a report titled "REDD Myths". At the UNFCCC talks in Poznan, FOE says it will oppose attempts to include forests in carbon markets.

"During the climate talks, we will be demanding that forests are kept out of carbon markets, that plantations are entirely excluded and land rights are enforced as the basis of any forest policy," said Joseph Zacune, Climate and Energy Coordinator with FOE. "If governments are serious about tackling climate change, deforestation must be stopped once and for all. To do this we need to tackle the consumption of agrofuels, meat and timber products which is driving deforestation and support good governance of forest resources."

Other analysts say REDD — in a form that recognizes rural peoples' rights — offers the best hope for preserving forests in the future while simultaneously fighting global warming.

"REDD can benefit biodiversity conservation as well as indigenous and rural peoples," wrote Daniel Nepstad, Stephan Schwartzman, and Paulo Moutinho in a report published last year. "To succeed, national REDD programs must be consistent with UNFCCC and other UN principles, be transparent and have the active involvement of indigenous peoples and forest communities."

"Rejecting REDD will not defend indigenous rights. Substituting official aid from developed countries for carbon market funding will not be a better, less risky alternative for reducing deforestation. Indigenous rights abuses, often caused by the same activities that drive deforestation, must be addressed directly."

Despite financial crunch, donors pledge $100M for rainforest conservation (10/23/2008) Donors meeting this week in Washington D.C. pledged more than $100 million to the World Bank's new initiative for conserving tropical forests. In addition to the $100 million in donations, the World Bank announced that more than forty developing countries have asked to join the Forest Carbon Partnership Facility — the Bank's foray into the emerging market for forest carbon credits. 25 countries have so far been selected to participate in the initiative, which builds capacity for countries to earn compensation through the carbon markets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions by reducing deforestation and forest degradation (REDD). Experts say the mechanism could eventually lead to the transfer of billions of dollars per year to fund conservation and rural development in tropical countries, while at the same time helping fight climate change. Deforestation and land use change presently accounts for around a fifth of anthropogenic emissions.

Carbon conservation schemes will fail without forest people (10/16/2008) Mechanisms that use forest conservation to reduce greenhouse gas emissions are doomed to fail unless they are "based on respect for the rights of indigenous peoples and forest communities," warn environmentalists and indigenous rights groups meeting in Oslo this week. Indigenous groups fear they are being excluded from discussions on Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD), a proposed financial mechanism that would compensate tropical countries for reducing emissions caused by deforestation and land use. Such emissions account for a fifth of the global total, or more than the total emissions from transportation. In particular, indigenous groups and forest communities are concerned they will not see benefits from REDD. Worse, some believe the mechanism could trigger a new wave of land grabs and evictions by parties seeking to capitalize on carbon payments. Indigenous groups and forest communities have long struggled against development interests seeking to exploit their traditional lands and resources. But supporters of so-called "avoided deforestation" schemes say that properly-designed policy offers unprecedented opportunities to create sustainable livelihoods for forest people while safeguarding biodiversity and services provided by healthy forest ecosystems.

With more than 80,000 unique daily visitors, Mongabay.com is one of the world's most popular environmental science sites. The news and rainforests sections of the site are widely cited for information on tropical forests, conservation, and wildlife.

Mongabay.com aims to raise interest in wildlife and wildlands while promoting awareness of environmental issues. Originally the site was based around a text on tropical rainforests, but today the site has expanded to other topics (like Madagascar [WildMadagasacar.org]) and is available in versions for kids and in about two dozen non-English languages. {jcomments off}